The Archaeo- Palaeontological sites of the Middle Pleistocene at Ambrona and Torralba (Soria).

Abstract

There are not many sites supplying significant information in order to enlarge our knowledge of the activities of human groups in the Lower Palaeolithic. Most of them conserve only artefacts of stone together with chips and flakes produced in their preparation and few sites offer in addition wide-ranging sets of fauna, palaeo-environmental information and other items, such as for instance wood. Torralba and Ambrona, two sites known to scientists since the beginning of the century, correspond to this second category and are particularly distinguished by the abundant presence of faunal remains, particularly elephants. The wealth and variety of the information recovered from these two locations contribute to enlarge our knowledge on the environment of the ages in which these deposits were accumulated, of the fauna and vegetation and, in short, to a better understanding of the ecosystems in which the groups of Palaeolithic humans lived.